


The Last Degree of Reds

by madeinessos



Category: Black Panther (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crimson Peak Inspired, F/M, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, M/M, POV Multiple
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-23
Updated: 2019-01-31
Packaged: 2019-09-25 06:35:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17116280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madeinessos/pseuds/madeinessos
Summary: Crimson Peak AU:"Erik, this is your home now. You have nowhere else to go."There are no other houses within miles of Panther Hall, and the town is half a day's ride away. For so long only two people have lived there. Now there are three, according to the local post office: T'Challa, Baron Panther, his sister Lady Nakia, and her new husband the foreigner Mr Stevens.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> “Blackness isn’t black. It is **the last degree of reds**. The secret blood of reds.”
> 
> — Hélène Cixous

** 1902 **

Linda was banging on the door.

The knocker was made from heavy metal, a rich dark colour, engraved with curves and slopes. It matched with the heavy and imposing double doors. Linda shifted her grip, her gloved fingers having grown a little stiff, and huddling further into her woollen coat, she proceeded to unleash a fresh round of banging into the stormy night.

The wind shrieked. The snows whipped and whirled and sliced through the wind. And Linda kept on banging, banging, banging.

Then, the door shuddered.

Linda paused.

When another shudder came, she dropped her hand and took half a step back.

 _Very few people up there_ , a local man at the depot had told her. No horses for hire tonight on account of the weather, he’d said. Then he’d added that his name was W’Kabi. He’d also squinted at her with what appeared to be a mixture of disbelief and pity. _No one’s like to answer, I tell you. Really, miss, you shouldn’t go. And your own horse here looks tired to death._

 _But can I get there on foot?_ Linda had pressed.

_Well, yes, but that’ll take you four hours and –_

_I had better start then._

_Better sta – miss! You shouldn’t go – you – miss!_

But go, Linda had done.

Through the shrieking wind, she’d banged on a door.

And the door, at last, groaned open.

Slowly.

Maddeningly slow.

Linda secured her hat on her head, popped her coat collar higher. Snow plopped about her in wet bits and lumps. She restrained herself from enjoying a stomp or ten, a small relief from the cold or worry or impatience or all three.

Linda never took her eyes off the doors. She wished the lamps by them were lighted.

Then –

Slowly, as if peeling herself off the shadows, Lady Nakia emerged on the threshold.

For a heartbeat Linda stared.

She was a little taken aback, despite it all. She had almost forgotten what a striking woman Lady Nakia was.

Lady Nakia’s ivory nightgown drooped completely off one glowing shoulder. A peignoir was worn over the nightgown, likewise dripping about her in languid folds, and tied at the front with a crimson ribbon sash. Her hair was a black waist-length tumble of unpinned braid. And Lady Nakia’s eyes, fixed on Linda, were luminous and quizzical.

Linda cleared her throat. She said, “Good evening.”

“Doctor.” Lady Nakia drew her green peignoir tighter about her arms. “Doctor Sansour, is it not? Whatever are you doing out here? In such ghastly weather. We did not know you crossed the ocean.”

Linda could feel her own lips curving tightly. “Should’ve sent a wire, but.” Did it pass for a courteous smile? “Thought you’d enjoy the surprise.”

“The hour is late,” Lady Nakia pointed out. She had not moved aside from the threshold, and her gaze had an unnerving intensity about it even in this stormy darkness. “You look terribly weary. Did you walk all the way from the post office?”

“I did.”

“Four hours of walk, or more –”

“How’s Erik?”

She needed to get him out of here, right this instant.

Lady Nakia paused. She brought her hand up to her chin, tapped her lips with her fingertips. A crimson gemstone glinted dully on one finger.

“He fell down –”

“What!”

Linda yanked her suitcase from the steps and rushed forward.

Lady Nakia’s hand shot out. Her grip on Linda’s upper arm was surprisingly strong.

“I’m afraid I have not invited you in, just yet.” Lady Nakia’s grip squeezed, brief, biting. “This is my house,” she said in low, crisp tones. “You shall hear what I have to say.”

Carefully, Linda shook her arm free. She didn’t take another step forward nor did she take her eyes off Lady Nakia’s. She kept her voice measured. “Thought this is your brother’s house. The baron.”

Lady Nakia paused again.

Then, her lips twisted. It was almost a smile.

“You overstep, Doctor Sansour. Though I would not expect you to understand such matters. You were, however, asking about my husband?”

Lady Nakia appeared to be unarmed. But who knew what she could be hiding amongst those fabrics, and Erik hadn’t been in touch in a long while, and if the puzzle pieces and Linda’s deductions proved to be true –

Linda’s suitcase seemed to grow heavier with the knowledge she’d collected.

“Yes,” she said shortly. “Fell down, is that right.”

“He’s been very ill,” Lady Nakia explained. She clasped her hands together again, subsiding back to a striking but ultimately harmless countenance. The crimson gemstone was a subtle glow on her finger, near her heart. And she was going on: “It’s the damp, I think, he’s simply not used to it. And he’s grown worse, I am grieved to say. Sleepwalking. Delirious. Mumbling about ghosts, visions. You will see, Doctor.”

Oh good. Linda supposed she would be invited in anytime within the hour.

“That doesn’t sound good,” she agreed. “I was hoping to see him. Though in good health, not least because of his mourning and everything. I’m very fond of him.”

“Of course.” Lady Nakia took Linda’s arm, gently this time, as if they were about to take a stroll, and started to draw her into the house. “Of course,” she repeated, with a reassuring squeeze. “I see that now. It is a blessing for you to have come after all, Doctor. Lord Panther and I have been frantic. Just frantic. We did not know what to do.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kindly mind the tags. You're also welcome to suggest if I should edit or add tags. :D

** 1883 **

In all his thirteen years of life, there had been only two constant comforts in T’Challa’s world. The first was his older sister Nakia. The second was wherever she might be. And as she was always at home – often alone in her bedchamber or mostly with him in their attic schoolroom these days – Panther Hall had also become the second constant comfort for T’Challa. He could be lucky like that.

But the _entirety_ of Panther Hall was not a comfort to T’Challa. Not really.

For instance, the main sitting room was definitely not the place for him and his sister. It was for the lord and lady of the house. That is, if they could stand to be in each other’s presence that day. And wherever Father and Mother were these past few years, it was scarcely a place of comfort for T’Challa.

Much less for Nakia.

“Should we be here?” he whispered worriedly.

Nakia did not care to whisper. “They are not here, are they?”

That was technically true. Mother was away in a distant town. Father had recently died.

And so, hand in hand, T’Challa and Nakia edged their way into the main sitting room.

It was a room of cold daylight and heavy colours. Cloudy amber glass globes over teak sconces. Bound by golden frames were oil paintings, done in thick globs and richly dark colours, depicting snowy hills or foggy hills or sunlit hills. Intricate rosewood armrests and table legs. Burgundy decorative pillows with tassels of smoky silver.

There was the piano shrouded with a mantle of fine lace. The lace had a rusty stain on it, thin and shaped like a crescent, because that was where Mother put her wine cup whenever she played the piano. And she often played the piano. Vigorous pieces. Clanging and foreboding banging. The smell of nutmeg and raisins in mulled wine, ringing octaves, and the tart scent of fresh oranges: all these meant that Mother was home.

There were also the old, old armchairs. Plush dark purple seats and carved high backs. Father used to settle on one. There he would spend hours rustling newspaper pages, or sighing irritably, or flipping through one of the family’s books, the pages sometimes wavy and soft and older than his own grandfather. And all the while his packed bronze pipe would be wreathing him with smoke.

Some of these armchairs were charmingly grouped near the hearth. And the hearth itself was made with something special. Like the floor.

The entire floor sampled their family’s pride: dark crimson tiles. Heavy. Finely crafted. All made from the splendid red clay of their family’s mines. But T’Challa could see several faded corners and scuffed spots on these tiles. Like old smeared blood.

Even the fireplace’s red tiles were still sooty. The piano lace seemed to ooze like dirty cream. The armchairs crouched sadly.

Mother had been away for a month now, and Father was gone longer than that.

They had had rows with increasing frequency and volume. About all sorts of things too: the mines which had caved in, the dead workers, the fled workers, the disastrous business attempts across the ocean, Father’s parties, offending Queen Bast, a vague crime referred to only as That Matter, the royal household terminating clay business with them, parcels and parcels of land taken away from them, the fled servants, the dismissed servants, Father’s travels, Mother’s travels.

And now the remaining three had been more neglectful than usual.

“Look here,” said Nakia.

They drifted towards one wall. A glass-topped table was pushed against it. On the table lay a large book jacketed with crimson velvet. It was open on the recent curls and twigs of their family tree.

The page marker was a long white ribbon. In black letters, it reminded them that nothing was as accursed as slaying your own blood.

They paused over it. Everybody knew that.

Then, delicately, T’Challa lifted it off the page.

“To the hills we raise our eyes,” Nakia read in solemn tones. Their family motto.

T’Challa squeezed their joined hands in excitement. He pointed. “It’s us! I can see us!”

And, indeed, those were their names.

T’Chaka, who was Father. Who had also been, once upon a time, the Duke of Wakanda.

Then, a strange thing. A blotted out name where Father’s sibling used to be. T’Challa and Nakia paused over that as well. No one had ever told them that Father had a sibling.

“Disgraced or disowned,” was Nakia’s verdict. “The dead have never been erased, see.”

Next came Ramonda, who was Mother, who was also Father’s first cousin.

Then it was Nakia, who was two years older than T’Challa.

There was also something strange about her name.

Nakia’s name was attached to both Father’s and Mother’s, in broken lines, instead of being a fruit of a union line between them like T’Challa’s name. There was a legend next to Nakia’s name. The note stated that she was either a child of Father’s from his first marriage or a child of Mother’s from her own first marriage. Though depending on which rumour you believed, Mother was either Father’s first cousin or his half-sister, or both. But it hardly mattered, anyway, since Nakia had already been put aside as heir on account of all this dubiousness.

T’Challa and Nakia glanced at each other. They held on to each other tighter.

And so there was T’Challa’s name. Their family had regained just enough of their lands for him to be installed as Baron Panther early this year.

“We should go,” T’Challa said. He didn’t know if he liked looking at this book. He glanced over his shoulder, at the doors leading back to the entrance hall. “Come, Nakia. We should go.” He added, “I’m making a rabbit toy for you. The one you told me about.”

But Nakia wasn’t moving. “Are you afraid?” she asked, eyebrows raised. “No need for that. You saw the book. We will own this house in the future.”

“Yes. But we’re not allowed _here_ ,” he reminded her. “For now.”

For a few more of T’Challa’s birthdays.

“Do you see Father or Mother here? Right now?”

T’Challa bit his lip. “No.”

“No,” agreed Nakia, and then she was slipping her hand out of his. She approached the piano. Shook the lace mantle off it. Sat down by its ivory keys.

T’Challa hesitated. He hurried to the doors and shut them.

Then he settled on the armchair nearest her, excited despite himself.

Of the two of them it was Nakia who had taken to music. She used to have proper lessons, too, with a private tutor and everything. The way T’Challa used to have private lessons on lots of subjects, before everything had crumbled down.

Nakia started to play.

Cold afternoon light was floating in from the diamond-paned windows. It was a quiet sort of light. It was fitting for her music: brooding tunes, melancholic. The throb of a river at night.

But Nakia’s fingers were graceful upon the keys, deft, liquid. In this light, her hair ribbons had turned into the colour of glossy cherries. Alive. Leaping off. The pale green ruffles on her sleeves quivered as she played. Her eyes were bright. And her smile, deep and pleased, was T’Challa’s favourite.

Not many things made her smile. So T’Challa always did his best to cheer her up.

Attentively, he let her music sweep over him. He traced tiny waves in the air, in time with the melody. On his hand, there was a faint whiff of the rosewater that Nakia used for her baths. T’Challa swayed on the plush dark purple seat.

He clapped when she finished.

Then he bounded forward, and pulled her to her feet, to his arms, and they were dancing.

It was a cheerier dance than her music. Their heels clacked on the dark crimson tiles. But Nakia was giggling, her hands still warm from her music, and T’Challa was beaming, pleased. She skipped to where he pulled. He glided to where she pushed. And they were doing it at the same time. They were laughing. No toes were harmed.

They embraced and danced, danced and embraced. They whispered secrets.

Then they danced some more, in the cold daylight, surrounded by heavy colours, as though they had always been allowed in the main sitting room.

As though they already were.

They kept on dancing, the little lord and the little lady.

*

T’Challa could still remember the times when Nakia was merrier.

But those times seemed to be from another era. From another world.

Back then their family owned twelve castles. Their family had mined and sold loads and loads of red clay. Back then T’Challa was styled Earl as a courtesy. He had been a dutiful, obedient heir. He had been set to inherit the duty of governing stretches of farmland, numerous people, and even more hills, each climbing closer to the horizon than the last. Back then Nakia had her pick of tutors and lessons. Her appetite for lessons had been exceeded only by her appetite for bitter chocolate. And chocolate, not grown anywhere in the kingdom, was more costly than lessons.

In those days, it was Nakia’s habit to sneak into the kitchens and grab the hot silver cup. It was a game to her. She fancied herself a spy. And a cup of hot chocolate, freshly made each morning, was always left near the kitchen door for Lady Nakia.

But she always shared her treat with T’Challa. Nakia was always grinning when she found him. More often than not, he was attending his own occasionally dull lessons. The mingled smell of rosewater and chocolate rounding a corner was joy to him. He loved waiting for her to come.

Bitter chocolate and sunny days. Hope was only a word to T’Challa, found in storybooks and such.

And Nakia always rinsed the cup in her wash basin before sneaking it back onto the same kitchen table.

Back then, Nakia’s warm kindness knew no bounds.

*

His sister’s favourite cook was called Gugulethu. She was a woman with a heart-shaped face, a keen palate, and had cooked for the queen herself a handful of times.

It was also Gugulethu who brewed the chocolate.

It was she who dotingly put the cup near the kitchen door, every morning, for the little lady. It was she who squeezed in six honeycakes on a tray for four because honeycakes were T’Challa’s favourite. Nakia had quickly learned to ring the bell for her. Dainty rings, so Gugulethu could stand by their table and they could ask her about the food.

Soon they were asking her for stories. For her company. For her smiles and doting pats. Gugulethu was there when Father was away. She was also there when Mother was away.

Then the day came when Gugulethu was dismissed.

She was neither the first nor the last of their household to be dismissed. It was still awful when they heard. The silver cup slipped from Nakia’s fingers as T’Challa was passing it back to her.

And Nakia promptly rushed down to the yard.

T’Challa ran after her, ignoring his tutor’s calls.

Outside he found commotion. Leaves swirling in the wind. Nakia clutching at the cook’s arm. Nakia digging in her hand-stitched leather shoes as she tugged with all her might. Nakia weeping. Gugulethu’s sad, sad face. A knot of their remaining footmen and gardeners. Father striding from around the corner, bronze pipe in one hand, thunderous scowl on his brows. Nakia’s impertinent boldness.

T’Challa cried because Nakia was crying.

He cried even harder when she was caned that afternoon.

When she wobbled back into their attic schoolroom, Nakia’s cheeks were dry. But her eyes were glassy. Her lower lip had deep bite marks, some of them bleeding. T’Challa made two toys for her that week.

“I did not cry,” she told T’Challa. She gave him a reassuring pat on the arm. “I nearly did. But I bit my lip so hard. And I thought: Let him try.”

“Nakia, please stop this,” he said. Not for the first time. “Please don’t do that again. Stop vexing Father.”

“Father is always cross these days.”

“So stop doing this. Please.” T’Challa started to cry again. He didn’t understand why Nakia found it so hard to follow the rules. She just needed to follow the rules. “Please. You might break a leg, too. Like Mother.”

*

During one of Father and Mother’s fights, they nearly ruined the upholstery. The decree terminating their House’s centuries-old clay business with the royal household had been ripped almost in two. It was left on the floor. Ignored for two days.

There were more pressing concerns.

A broken leg for Mother.

A broken arm for Father, and one of his cheeks scratched so severely it had almost taken out his eye.

All around them hung the smells of creams and liniments, of strange alcohols and the physician’s mint leaves. In between groans of pain, Mother made sure to voice her dislike for these “stinks.”

Whilst Mother’s remaining ladies tended to her, it had been Nakia who slipped off Mother’s ring from her bloody finger.

T’Challa huddled with her in Mother’s outer chamber. He watched Nakia gently soap off Father’s blood and flesh and eyelashes, until the gemstone shone crimson again. It was their family’s chief jewel. Very, very old. Older than old.

*

T’Challa could build anything with his hands.

It was not a boast. He had done it loads of times. Give him a block of wood, and he could bend it into graceful shapes. Tinker with it and prod it into clever shapes.

Father had urged him to love racing horses, but T’Challa always drifted to study desks with their guts out. Their clever compartments. Their sandpapered, carved, oiled secret holders. He also drifted towards the greasy tanks in the cellars. The shiny metals in clocks. The ovens in the kitchens. On one occasion he’d come into the house with his dress shirt in greasy ruins, wood shavings clinging to his trousers. He’d been scolded for that. Forbidden to go near household machines. Would he like for his fingers to be cut off with metal teeth? Did he like getting filthy?

In their attic schoolroom, when they were alone, T’Challa could build anything.

Nakia always ruffled his hair when he showed her drawings and plans. She encouraged him. She called him her little lord engineer.

So in that attic schoolroom, where nobody bothered them after a certain year, they were free to be. There was only one window. Circular glasswork. A solemn saint painted on the glass. Beneath it, T’Challa could happily build whilst Nakia submerged herself in books.

After Mother had broken her leg and T’Challa’s tutor had been dismissed, Nakia took to telling him bedtime stories. Scraps from all she had read, stitched together. She told him tales. She sang him songs. T’Challa loved them very much and went to sleep cosy in her arms. He didn’t dream bad dreams.

At first he made toys for her just because he could.

As the years went by and as their fortunes plunged, T’Challa made toys inspired by Nakia’s tales to cheer her up.

*

He made her two painted toys after she had to butcher a pig for the first time.

It was a fine summer day. Iced coconut. Honey. They had no more bitter chocolate. Only four honeycakes on a tray for four. For breakfast, T’Challa had given his honeycake to Nakia.

Then he accompanied her to the kitchen yard. He watched her tie a coarse cotton apron over her most frayed frock. He watched her pull on large rubber gloves. There was buzzing in the air. Fat bees. Fatter flies.

The fattest pig with beady little eyes.

He watched Nakia pick up a small axe.

T’Challa could tell at once that Nakia hated it.

She hated killing the pig, and chopping it up, and preparing it into portions. She was quick enough to puzzle out how to cook, but he could tell that she hated sweating by the ovens. She hated washing the apron and the gloves. She hated that they had lost even butchers and kitchen maids.

She hated that they had lost everything.

Later, T’Challa became sure that it had started that summer day. It started then. Nakia’s warm kindness began to retract. From its wide-reaching diameter, closer and closer it crawled back, until it was just large enough for only her and T’Challa to fit in.

*

T’Challa made her two painted toys that week. Characters from her favourite stitched-together scrap-stories.

Then, hand in hand, they rambled all afternoon in an abandoned clay mine.

T’Challa loved thinking about how to dig up more clay. Nakia loved the red clay itself.

It was a happy afternoon. They pretended to have tea: red clay piled up in random tin cans, red clay plopped like icing on pebbles. They enjoyed flinging rubbish into a pit. Enjoyed watching the red clay swallow it up. T’Challa threw stones and twigs. Nakia threw shredded pig hide.

It soon became a regular afternoon visit. Red clay tea.

*

“And where,” said Father at dinner, “is the skin? Nakia? I thought I told you to serve it. I told you to dry it and fry it in oil and salt.”

A single candelabra was lighted.

They were in the breakfast room even though it was seven in the evening. Smaller room, smaller table. No footmen to attend them. No butler to oversee the service. Only three set places tonight, too. Mother was away in a distant town. Too see a physician, and to attend a party.

T’Challa’s palm started to grow clammy around his fork.

Nakia was slowly putting down her own fork. “I threw it in a pit.”

“That was ill done.” Father’s voice was level. But he had his scowl on. “Ill done indeed. You will stay after the meal.”

“No,” said T’Challa.

Nakia looked at him.

Father looked at him. And looked at him. “What did you say to me?”

“T’Challa, no,” said Nakia, breathless.

T’Challa fought to keep his eyes on Father. “I said don’t cane her.”

“What did you say to me?” Father repeated.

“I said,” T’Challa ground out, his jaw so tight, his palms sweating, “don’t you hurt her.”

Father leapt off his chair so fast he upturned it. He seized T’Challa by the arm. “Insolence,” he was raging. He dragged T’Challa off his own seat. “Insubordination. Mine own flesh. Own blood. I will not suffer it! I will not, oh no. You ought to be caned as well.”

T’Challa twisted and squirmed. But Father’s good grip was iron.

“No!” shouted Nakia. “No, stop!”

She’d jumped to her feet. Her eyes were wide. Frightened.

“Stay on your seat!” Father thundered.

Nakia snatched up the candelabra and jabbed the fires on Father’s waistcoat.

*

Father did not die in the candelabra fire.

But he’d been sufficiently distracted that T’Challa and Nakia did not receive their caning until the next evening.

That night, after her last lullaby for him, Nakia hugged him tighter. There were tears lurking at the corners of her eyes. One of them wept down, sideways, across her nose.

And, for the first time, a caning had enraged her.

*

T’Challa watched Nakia’s warm kindness creep back some more.

Every morning T’Challa was tutored by Father himself. Accounts. Household rolls. Failed businesses.

Every day Nakia puzzled over cookbooks, and wept tearlessly over her coarse cotton apron. Every day she also rubbed creams and liniments on Mother’s leg and hip, when Mother was home.

They still had their happy afternoons alone. Rambling. Exploring the rest of the red clay hill around Panther Hall. Rubbish-throwing. Red clay tea.

*

After dancing in the main sitting room, in the cold daylight, surrounded by heavy colours, T’Challa and Nakia forwent their afternoon walk.

They had the house to themselves.

They heated bath water with a lot more coal than usual. They were laughing. Nakia brought two tall crystal glasses of iced coconut. T’Challa took a long whiff of rosewater. Then he poured it into the hot tub.


End file.
